


Fictional Happy Ends

by Deviant_Accumulation



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Gen, Pairing if you Squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-19
Updated: 2014-02-19
Packaged: 2018-01-13 01:36:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1207978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deviant_Accumulation/pseuds/Deviant_Accumulation
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing about huge, epic magic battles is that they look much more epic when you can observe them from a distance. A huge distance. Say, one mile away. With bullet proof glass between you and said magic battle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fictional Happy Ends

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Stars-ashes for beta-ing!  
> Please leave a comment and let me know what you think!

The thing about huge, epic magic battles is that they look much more epic when you can observe them from a distance. A huge distance. Say, one mile away. With bullet proof glass between you and said magic battle.

You were definitely less at risk than when said battle was happening literally one story below you and you could feel the tremor and vestigia that was vibrating in the air all the way through the concrete floor.

Maybe it had been a bit naïve to think that a huge abandoned factory would be huge enough to contain a huge magic battle between two masters of magic, but it was a bit too late to do anything about it and Peter just hoped that the whole building would collapse after he had disabled the nefarious Device Of Doom Faceless had designed (which was seriously so cliché — who even designed those things anymore? This wasn’t a bloody Bond movie). So far, the disabling part was looking quite good, though he was internally weeping a bit as he hacked through bundles of cable (it would have been really interesting to know how actually the Device Of Doom worked). But alas, there was the potential of at least a quarter of the population of London dying, so there really wasn’t much hesitation in his vandalism.

The floor rocked again, nearly strong enough to throw him off his feet and stab himself  with the giant cable shears — or alternatively end up accidentally touching the cables and electrocuting himself. He swayed for a moment, arms flailing to regain his balance and let out a relieved sigh when he did. The fight under him seemed to be getting worse and worse, making him hurry even more. He really hoped that Nightingale was faring well against Faceless, but had seriously no way of telling, since he hadn’t even seen the start of the battle — which was quite useful seeing as Faceless was supposed to think that he was still rotting in some magically-locked cellar in the outskirts of London that he had thrown Peter into (which had been very rude and also pretty awful because it had stunk terribly and the magic probably would have killed him if he hadn’t been able to get himself out in time).

Another bundle of cables were sliced in two and finally the machine (which sounded boring – ‘Device of Doom’ was much better) gave a sign that his actions were actually having some effect as it started to sputter, the previous buzzes and occasional sparks it had been giving off growing more erratic. It wasn’t a very reassuring sound and Peter hurriedly looked around, searching for any cables he might have missed, running around towards the back of the Device of Doom to find one last thick cable.

The floor started to shake violently and he was more stumbling than walking as he closed the distance to the last one, taking two tries to bring the shears in the right position an—

_Snap_.

The Device of Doom gave one last faint whirr and then died, the cables inside it ceasing to glow and the panels going dark.

Peter heaved a deep sigh of relief, nearly collapsing right on the spot from exhaustion, ongoing magic battle be damned.

But ongoing magic battles didn’t seem to take very kindly to being ignored, as the floor still hadn’t stopped shaking, and Peter quickly drew himself upright, moving in the direction of the door that would lead to the fire escape stairs.

He didn’t get very far.

The shaking got worse as the oscillations synchronised and became more powerful. The noise of it was nearly deafening and he had to resist the urge to press his hands to his ears, nearly tripping over his own feet.

  
Which was when he noticed the cracks in the floor.

He stilled for a split second which, in hindsight, was not a good idea.

One split second was all it took for the cracks to spread across the whole floor, making a horrible noise like the terrible muffled sound you hear when the thick ice on frozen lakes suddenly cracks.

And then the concrete shattered underneath him.

‘Aw fuck,’ Peter thought, and then he was falling down.

Now, having seen the factory from the outside he knew that he would be falling approximately fifteen meters down to meet with another — very hard — concrete floor.

In the few seconds that he had before he would meet said floor, he concentrated through the initial panic, in his mind shaping the formae for impello, congolate, and aer. Which should, if it worked, form an elastic pillow of air underneath him.

It did, though with the minor setback of being not very _soft_ but very _compact_ instead. Still better than hard concrete, but he would definitely sport an impressive set of bruises tomorrow.

Next to him, large chunks of concrete shattered against the floor, the sound making his ears ring, huge clouds of dust billowing up and he had to keep himself from coughing as he accidentally breathed some of it in. He looked around, trying to ascertain his surroundings, but the dust made it impossible to see further than five feet. A little way away from him laid the Device of Doom — or what was left of it — looking ready for the next garbage pit, surrounded by shattered thick plates of what used to be the upper story’s floor.

‘You rat!’ someone was screaming from beyond the dust. The voice sounded distorted and shrill to his maltreated ears, but he would have bet a month’s salary that the voice belonged to Faceless. Which was a _very bad sign_ , because he seemed to be very unhappy with Peter and the fact that he was still alive. And that he had destroyed his Device of Doom.

The screaming was interrupted by a loud, dull smash and the sound of what was probably flesh colliding with a hard and resilient surface, followed by a guttural howl.

The dust started to thin and settle onto the wreckage, giving way to the view of the factory hall.

The first thing Peter noticed was Nightingale. He was standing about twenty meters away from him, his body half-way turned to Peter, but his eyes looking somewhere to Peter’s right. There was concrete dust all over his dark coat and in his hair, the latter completely dishevelled from its usual pristine state, one side clumped together with what seemed to be blood that was also running down the side of his face, but since he was still standing Peter hoped it was merely a minor wound on the head. What was more worrying was the way he seemed to be favouring his left side, his back slightly bent instead of the usually straight posture.

Still, he wasn’t dead or dying from the looks of it and that was enough to make Peter nearly burst out in chants of ‘alive, alive, alive!’.

For a second, Nightingale’s eyes flickered towards him, finding him amidst the rumble (he must have looked quite the sight, covered in white dust) and he saw his own relief mirrored in his mentor’s face before he looked back to…

Pulling himself together, Peter followed Nightingale’s line of vision to the wall of the factory he was facing.

There, pinned to the wall by a bent steel beam, the ends of which had literally been jammed into the wall, was Faceless, furiously baring his teeth at Nightingale (which looked weird, because you still couldn’t really see his face) and twisting against his bonds.

Then he noticed Peter and his head whipped around, tousled hair falling into the place where his face should be. Despite the absence of visible eyes the hatred directed at him nearly made him flinch in its intensity.

'You!' Faceless snarled. 'How fucking dare you, you—‘

'Oh, shut up already,’ Nightingale cut him off. 'Face it, you're done for, no amount of insults will change that. You have no magic left with which to fight anymore.'

At his words, Faceless stilled his struggling, turning his head to look at Nightingale.

There was a moment of eerie silence when Faceless just stared at him, head slightly cocked to the side in consideration.

Then he burst out laughing.

Peter flinched, the sound grating and with a manic edge.

The laughter finally died, save for an occasional giggle, leaving the man leaning against the wall, breathing heavily.

'Well, you're right, I can't deny it,’ he said, shrugging nonchalantly as well as he was able to in his current position. 'I lose. But you know what?'

He leaned forward.

'So do you.'

It all happened very fast.

Faceless ripped one of his arms out from under the beam with a horrible ripping sound that suggested torn skin. A flash of vestigia, razor wire, and blood.

Peter managed to whip up his shield in time, but the spell just tore through the hastily created defence and hit him right in the chest.

He expected pain, but instead it just felt cold, like someone had pressed an ice cube against his chest, slowly spreading out from where the spell had hit him.

Then came the pain, zapping through his body, and he crumbled, falling to the floor in a graceless heap of limbs.

In the distance he could hear someone screaming his name and Faceless laughing, a gurgling sound that was suddenly cut off.

He lay on the ground, trying to remember how to breathe, but all he managed were tiny gasps. His vision was blurring and his limbs wouldn't move and the pain was unbearable and he would have screamed if there had been enough air in his lungs.

Suddenly there where hands on him, turning him onto his back, and he looked up at Nightingale.

Nightingale wasn’t looking at him, instead focused on his chest where he had pressed his palms flat against the T-shirt, just above the point where the spell had hit him and the pain felt the strongest, his face looking like it was carved out of stone, pale under the blood and dust and completely devoid of any emotion.

If he hadn’t thought it was bad, now he certainly did.

He tried to say Nightingale’s name, but all that came out was a low wheeze, speaking seeming endlessly more strenuous than it ever felt before. Still, it got the other man’s attention for a moment, his eyes flickering to Peter’s face, before snapping back to his hands.

‘Hey,’ he tried again, this time actual syllables coming out of his mouth. ‘How bad—’ _is it_ , he wanted to say, but was cut off by a coughing fit as his lungs seemed to forget how to work.

Still, it was enough to get the meaning across.

‘It’s a curse,’ Nightingale said, avoiding his eyes. ‘It’ll spread through your body and once it has permeated entirely your body will stop all vital functions.’

‘Can you stop it?’ Peter asked, despite already knowing the answer.

Nightingale drew in a shaky breath and shook his head. ‘It’s… it’s quite a complex spell and diffusing it would take too much time… I don’t have enough magic left after the fight, I’d die before I’d even managed to complete the spell to heal you. There’s… there’s nothing I can do.’

‘Ah,’ Peter said, his voice raspy. ‘What happened to Faceless?’

‘I wasn’t lying when I said he had no magic left… using that last spell killed him.’

‘Crazy bastard,’ Peter murmured, and Nightingale let out a choked laugh.

‘I’m dying, aren't I?’ he asked, because somehow that final realisation seemed to still elude him, despite the biting pain, the weird numbness in his body, how he could barely make his own lips move—

‘Yes,’ Nightingale said and Peter closed his eyes.

He didn’t know why this outcome surprised him so much. Shouldn’t he have predicted this — that messing with crazy, evil master magicians might lead to his untimely demise? The answer was yes, of course, but still, actually _dying_ … there was still so much he wanted to do, so many hours he still wanted to just _live_.

Something wet dripped onto his arm and he opened his eyes to see Nightingale half-slumped, his shoulders trembling slightly as the tears streaked wet paths down his dusty face.

Peter tried to rise up, one hand stretching out to comfort him, but he didn’t get very far, his arm giving out under him. Nightingale caught him before he could crack his skull open on the concrete, hoisting him with one arm under his shoulders and neck.

‘Well, at least I get the dying in someone’s arms cliché,’ Peter muttered and Nightingale made a noise that sounded like a mixture of a laugh and a sob.

‘Would you prefer if I set you down?’ he asked.

‘No,’ Peter answered quickly. ‘I’d rather… not die alone.’

Nightingale nodded, and there were tears dripping down on Peter’s shoulders but Nightingale’s arms were warm against his cold skin so he could deal.

‘I’m sorry,’ Nightingale whispered suddenly, a frantic, desperate edge to his voice. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry—’

’S' okay,’ Peter said, trying his best to form the words.

‘No, it’s not,’ Nightingale retorted. ‘I just… All I wanted was for you to _live_.’ He continued, his voice breaking on the last word. ‘If someone was to die, I wanted it to be me and not you, so why… why…’ He broke off, tears streaming freely, his shoulders shaking as he cried.

‘I’m glad, though,’ Peter said with as much strength as he had left, feeling suddenly like it was very important that he at least said that.

‘What?’ Nightingale blinked against the tears in his eyes.

‘That I got to be your apprentice.’

‘Don’t,’ Nightingale said, pain audible in voice. ‘Peter, the reason you’re dying is because you are–’ He stopped, his words failing him,’… because you were—’

‘And I don’t regret it,’ Peter interrupted. ‘I don’t… ’ His mouth refused to form the last words as the curse finally reached its target and took hold of him.

‘I’m glad too, then,’ Nightingale choked out under the tears.

Peter lifted his arm, finding Nightingale’s hand where it gripped against his waist and gave it a squeeze, trying to express one final gesture of comfort.

He closed his eyes, and fell.


End file.
